Content note: this article contains references to suicidal ideation, which readers may find upsetting

In late April 2024, I sat in the attic bedroom of the tall coastal house I was renting with my husband and fantasised about walking out into the sea and never coming back. I was six months pregnant. I was horrified by the image that played on a loop in my head and overcome with guilt. What kind of a mother was I going to be if this was where my mind was at? What damage had I already caused to our baby by thinking like this? A small part of me, however, was also relieved at the idea that there was a way out, that I didn’t have to feel like this anymore.

Today, as I sit watching our son learn to crawl, memories of that dark time feel utterly appalling – but I had those thoughts and feelings. I was hopeless and furious. I didn’t understand why, but it was real and frightening.

Ostensibly, I had everything I wanted: I was married and expecting a baby, and we were about to move into our dream house in a beautiful place. I wasn’t a stranger to mental health issues, specifically hormonal ones, having been diagnosed with premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD ) in 2022 and prescribed SSRIs to manage it. I’d come off them when we’d started trying for a baby, thinking it was preferable to be totally medication-free at conception and in the first trimester. It didn’t occur to me to start taking them again. I’d never been pregnant before, so what did I know? Surely this was normal. Mood swings are part and parcel of the hormonal fluctuations of pregnancy, right?

“I fantasised about walking into the sea”: antenatal depression is real and common, so why aren’t more women warned about it?